


ready or not, here i come

by Czwizard, v_ichigo_v



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: M/M, WOOO, gardener!kageyama, idk uh flower au, sick!hinata, yay flowers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-14
Updated: 2015-02-14
Packaged: 2018-03-12 21:12:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3355442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Czwizard/pseuds/Czwizard, https://archiveofourown.org/users/v_ichigo_v/pseuds/v_ichigo_v
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"What's so good about flower crowns?" asked Tobio.</p>
<p>"They're fun to make," the boy had replied.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ready or not, here i come

ready or not, here i come

****  


_“The more my cruel heart pushes you out, the more I fall into your mystery.”_

  


_i. step by step, your smile digs into me_

****  
  


Tobio remembers the sun. He remembers tall sunflowers, orange, and that vague feeling of having small flower petals sprinkled over his head. His fingers remember the steps of making flower crowns, and he can only blame one person.

_“What’s so good about flower crowns?” asked Tobio._

__

_“They’re fun to make,” the boy had replied._

Even though he remembers orange, orange, and orange, he can’t remember why. Was it the color of some other flowers? Was it the voice of that boy who had handed him a sunflower and had said, _“Sunflowers are my favorite. What about yours?”_

Those words had remained in Tobio’s head for a long time. Imagine, a seven year old’s voice echoing, persisting, slowly fading, until Tobio can’t remember the color of his hair, or his eyes. Instead, he remembers _sunflowers_.

They had met each other everyday after school, playing with the flowers in Tobio’s garden. Tobio thought it was fun playing in the garden; almost as fun as volleyball. But he didn’t tell anyone that.

The boy was something else, alright. He shone as bright as the sun, despite his pale features. Tobio always thought that the boy looked tired, even gaunt,  but the boy never showed it.

He was delicate; shorter than Tobio too, but he had enthusiasm that made up for his height. He laughed and smiled, and pretty soon, he made Tobio smile too.

Tobio remembered a day where the boy had tried making Tobio play a game of hide and seek. Tobio agreed, and naturally, found the boy in a patch of sunflowers. Tobio had decided the game was fun, and played hide and seek until the boy had to leave for dinner.

“You should smile more often!” The boy had said, grinning as he waved goodbye.

Tobio had jutted his lip a little, but he couldn’t stop that lip from twitching upward.

But then, the boy had disappeared.

Tobio had thought in the beginning that this was a game of hide and seek. He remembered that he had to wait, wait some more, and then finally start looking. But when Tobio thought he had waited long enough, he never found the boy, not even in the sunflower patches the boy had loved hiding in so much.

Saddened, Tobio began making those flower crowns himself.

He stopped making the flower crowns after a week.

****  
  
  
  


“Again?” Tobio growled.

He can only scowl at the lilies that he had only planted yesterday, now slightly trampled; one of them now has a petal ripped off.

Kageyama Tobio is a gardener, at the soft age of twenty four, with the best flowers around, and probably(although he wouldn’t admit this) has a scowl that no one should have at this age.

Someone had been running through his flower beds again. It made him frustrated that he had put so much effort into planting all those flower beds, only to be stepped on the next day when he came back in the morning.

It all started when one day, he found a whole bed of violets stepped on, trashed, and even some uprooted.

He knew it had happened in the morning, because there weren’t any fresh tracks in the evening, and the fact that he tended to the garden in the noon made the elimination easy.

Tobio has grown tired of putting the beds back together. Tonight, he’s going to stay awake until morning comes, and he’ll discover the bastard who’s ruining all his hard work.

He’s about to get back up, when he sees something he hasn’t seen in a while. Something that makes him stop in his tracks and his eyes widen because wow, he hasn’t seen one of those in a long time.

It’s a flower crown.

Tobio walks over to it, lying on the soil on top of the azaleas. It’s hastily done, and when Tobio gingerly tries picking it up, the whole thing nearly falls apart, making him wince.

He carefully places it back down and walks away, trying to brush away the nostalgic feeling ebbing in his head.

****  
  
  


Tobio is very close to falling asleep, when he hears a noise. He almost jumps behind the bush in surprise. Hollow boredom quickly turns into excitement when he slowly peeks out of the bush.

There’s a flash of orange, and Tobio takes this as a chance, because _I’m going to teach that asshole not to mess with my flowers--_

He catches someone short with orange hair, caught in the act, standing in the middle of trashed poppies. The shortie’s jaw drops and he starts backing up, which only results in more poppies being stepped on and the deepening of Tobio’s scowl.

“ _What_ ,” Tobio starts. “Are you _doing_? You are stepping on my flowers--”

“Oh, shit, these are yours?” The boy has the decency to look guilty, and for some reason, he coughs a little. “Sorry about that, I was just jogging by--”

“I know that.” Says Tobio, venom dripping down his words. “What makes you think you have the authority to _step on my flowers_?” Tobio says this last part strained, and he can see the carrot head shrink.

“I said I was sorry!” The boy shouts back. “And besides, I didn’t know!”

“You should never step on someone else’s work!” Kageyama is nearly shouting now. “How would you know? How do you think these flowers got here? Wouldn’t it make more sense to think that--”

“Wow! You plant these flowers?” The boy’s eyes widen. “They’re all so pretty!”

“Hey! listen to me, you--”

“Oh!” The boy scrambles over to the roses and squats close to them. “There’s lots of different colors that roses can be, huh?”

Tobio’s starting to get irritated, fast. “I--”

The boy bounds toward Tobio, eyes gleaming. “Can I look around?”

Tobio puts on his scariest scowl, because there’s no way he’s going to let some fourteen year old ruin all his hard work.

He points a finger at the exit. “Leave.”

The boy shakes his head, jaw dropped. “What? Why? I just got here!”

Tobio wants to smack his own forehead. “Okay, do you realize that you are trespassing on my property?” He narrows his eyes for good measure. “I could call the police if I wanted to.”

The boy’s eyes narrow as well. “What?! No, you can’t--”

“I can--”

“I come here running everyday in the morning!” The boy shots back. “And you never said I had to stop!”

Tobio facepalms, slow and dragging. “That’s the point!” Tobio scoffs. “I came here to tell you to stop stepping on my plants when you run.”

Tobio is expecting another ‘WHAT?!” and draws his chest out to prepare the ammo--

“Okay.”

Tobio frowns. “What?”

“Yeah, I’ll stop stepping on your flowers.” Hinata nods, eyes gleaming in what he hopes isn’t mischief. Tobio decides to ignore it and lets out a sigh of relief.

“Finally--”

“But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to stop running here everyday.”

Tobio almost walks up to the shortie and strains himself not to poke his eyes out. Tobio can feel his eye twitching and he grits his teeth.

“By the way,” The boy bounces while speaking. “Since I’ll be coming all the time, I guess I should introduce myself.”

Tobio doesn’t have time to react before a hand shoots out at him and is waiting for a handshake. Afraid of what could happen if he doesn’t take it, he shakes this ‘Hinata’s’ hand, suspicious. He stares at Hinata’s hands. They’re small, but what can he expect from a high schooler?

“Hinata Shouyou, twenty four years old.”

Tobio freezes. Twenty four? _Twenty four?_ No way, he’s five feet, _tops_.

“And, uh, you are?”

Tobio realizes he’s just been standing there, staring at someone’s hands, and flushes a little. “Kageyama, twenty four.”

Hinata perks, finding out that they are the same age, but then scrunches his eyebrows together. “Just Kageyama?” Hinata wiggles his eyebrows for extra measure, and Tobio tells himself that punching someone that looks like a kid in public would not be a good idea.

“Kageyama...Tobio.” Tobio says stingily. “Just call me Kageyama.”

Hinata nods and grins so wide, Tobio thinks it might crack half his face.

“I’m Hinata! Nice to meet you!”

“You dumbass, you already told me that.”

****  
  


_ii. i just can’t hold onto your footsteps_

****  


Tobio hears a rustling of noise and jumps, but relaxes when he realizes it’s just that annoying twerp from yesterday.

“You’re here!” calls Hinata faintly, and Tobio nearly snorts.

“Of course, I own this garden.”

Tobio is so focused on trimming the rose thorns, that he nearly stumbles when Hinata runs over and almost falls on top of him, weight crashing onto him like a wave.

“Hey, you’re planting roses today!” Hinata drawls, and he reaches out to touch a rose bud.

Tobio swats Hinata’s hand away. “You can’t touch them.” Then, Tobio makes a ‘tch’ noise and shakes Hinata off his back.

Hinata pouts. “What?” He wails. “Why not?”

“Because,” Tobio snaps. “I don’t trust you.”

“But I want to!” Hinata says stubbornly. “They’re really pretty!”

“Good,” Tobio says dryly. “That’s more of a reason not to let you touch them.”

He can hear Hinata go silent from his side and Tobio almost lets out a sigh of relief. Then he can hear something shifting from behind him, and suddenly, Hinata’s at his side.

“Do you plant sunflowers?” Hinata queries.

Tobio stiffens. He starts to see orange, _orange_ , and flower crowns.

“No.” Tobio manages to choke out. “I don’t plant sunflowers.”

The flower crowns in his mind turn into something ugly and it starts spreading down to his stomach.

He doesn’t look at Hinata, because he can’t;   _flower crowns and orange._

“Why not?” He can see Hinata from the corner of his vision, trying to catch his eye. “You have a lot of flowers here, so--”

“I don’t plant sunflowers.” Tobio repeats menacingly, and that ugly feeling starts stirring around and he hates it. “ _Don’t_ ask again.”

Tobio hates how in his voice, there’s that unsaid ‘please’, and it irritates him because--

“Owowowowowowwwwww!”

Tobio whips to the side of him to see Hinata, sucking at his finger, and grinning sheepishly at him. Next to him, is a rose bush, and one of the rose stems has a slight tint of red.

“Oop’sh.” laughs Hinata, finger still in his mouth.

With gritted teeth, Tobio holds himself to not scream; _don’t scream._

“You dumbass, I already told you that you don’t touch the flowers!”

Hinata just turns away from Tobio, and crosses his arms. “I just wanted to touch them.”

Tobio is nervous. He was never good with people, even as a kid. He was introverted, and never talked to people unless he was talked to.

He hears another yelp from his side, and Tobio wonders why he hasn’t kicked him out yet.

****  
  


_iii. you have opened up my once locked-up heart like magic_

****  


  
“Hey, can I try planting a flower?”

“No.”

“Come on, I want to--”

“No.”

****  


_iv. everyday, my feelings grow stronger than yesterday_

****  
  


“Sunflowers are my favorite flowers.” Hinata says one day, sitting on one of the garden rocks. He’s drinking water from a plastic bottle.

Hinata starts coming here every morning, jogging to the garden from his apartment.

(“Why do you come so often anyway?”

Hinata grins widely. “To see if I can convince you to plant sunflow--OW!”)

Tobio tries choosing his words before he responds. “Okay.” He finally choose.

Hinata sits up straighter on his rock. “That’s all you have to say?”

When Tobio nods, Hinata abruptly stands up. “Just to let you know,” he starts shouting. “Sunflowers are the best!”

Tobio, already tired of this conversation, just nods. “Okay--”

“And they’re tall,” Hinata adds, obviously not caring that he had just interrupted him. “And they look like they have a bunch of other flowers inside the brown part!” And Tobio has to cringe because Hinata is talking too loud.

“Besides,” Hinata adds softly. “It was a long time ago, but…”

Hinata drifts off into his fantasy, and Tobio gets impatient.

“But what?”

Hinata jerks as if someone has woken him up from a daze, but only shakes his head. “Oh, it’s nothing.”

Tobio vaguely remembers the boy again for some unknown reason. he scrunches his eyes together to remember the slightest memory, but finds nothing; only a monochrome face looking as if someone has scribbled all over it.

“Kageyama, you look constipated!”

“...”

“Ow! Why did you hit me?!”

  
 

_v. you’re fatal and there’s no exit_

 

“Here.”

Hinata has a single package of sunflower seeds in his hands. He almost throws them at Tobio, with a pleading look.

“Please?”

Tobio barely spares the seeds a look, before turning away. “No.”

Hinata pouts. “What, why?!”

“Because I said so.” Tobio says plainly, bringing his attention back to the orchids.

Hinata lets out a wail of frustration and forcefully turns Tobio back around. “C’mon,” Hinata begs. “Sunflowers are the best!”

“No they aren’t.” Tobio snaps back.

Hinata’s lips press together in irritation and hurt. Tobio can hear him take a few steps back, and he almost starts to feel guilty.

But then, he hears Hinata’s voice again, calling out,”One day, I’ll convince you that sunflowers are the best!”

****  


_vi. you’re a light that dazzles in the starlight_

****  


It’s Hinata’s birthday and he has brought over a big slice of cake to celebrate. Tobio can’t tell if it’s a strawberry or cream cake because there’s a lot of strawberries and there’s even more cream. Tobio didn’t know that cakes could look so sweet, but apparently, they can.

“Why is it so big?” Tobio cautiously asks, and gets nervous when Hinata only laughs. But his eyes aren’t laughing.

“Because…” Hinata wavers a bit, and Tobio wonders if there’s even anything to think about when it comes to a slice of cake. “Well, otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to share much!”

Sliding his hand into his backpack, Hinata digs around and pulls out a plastic knife and paper plates. He takes the knife and cuts the cake in half while grinning wildly, and uses the knife to slide it on one of the plates before handing it to Tobio, hands shaking.

Tobio takes the cake in his hands and looks at it. Hinata has cut it in half, but it still looks pretty big.

“I don’t think I can finish this big of a slice,” Tobio protests, and when he turns to Hinata to add another thing, he can only stare in horror when he sees that Hinata’s slice is already half eaten, with some cream on his cheeks.

Hinata smiles, his teeth cake-laden. “Just finish what you can for now, then. I’ll finish it for you later.”

Tobio stares at his cake for a bit before starting with a bite, and nearly gags. The cake is sweet; too sweet, as expected. Not wanting to be rude, Tobio finishes what he can, and he manages to finish a third. When he spoons in the last bite of the cake that he can hold, he shudders at the sweetness and sets the cake down.

As soon as he places the plate down, it is snatched up, and he looks up to see Hinata, happily stuffing his face with the cake which Tobio has now renamed ‘Diabetes’. Tobio scrunches his eyebrows in disdain as he spots that Hinata still has some cream on his face.

Luckily, he brought napkins, and Tobio quickly grabs one, smothering it over Hinata’s cakey cheeks.

“You eat like a pig,” Tobio scoffs.

Hinata freezes, and for a second, Tobio wonders if he has said the wrong thing, _I mean, it is his birthday after all--_

He hears a laugh from next to him, and Tobio feels a rush of relief.

“I need the sugar.” Hinata says smiling, but something in his voice tells Tobio not to say anything else, so Tobio doesn’t.

****  


_vii. take it from me_

****  


Tobio doesn’t know why, but there’s this feeling when it comes to Hinata. First, Tobio thought that it was just irritation, but as time goes on, the feeling’s still there, so Tobio has concluded that somehow, this intruder doesn’t get on his nerves.

Much.

There was this one incident when Hinata had tripped over a nearby pot, and, knowing the domino effect, the other pots had fallen as well. Many of them had broken.

Tobio now knows not to store the pots all in one place.

“I have a question.” Hinata announces.

Tobio looks up from the irises and raises an eyebrow. Hinata usually just talks on and on, but Hinata asking a question? How unusual.

“Why don’t you plant sunflowers?” Hinata runs to where Tobio is sitting and plants himself on the soft soil floor. “I already know I asked this question once, but why?”

“Because,” Tobio’s jaw tightens. “I have bad experience with them.”

Tobio looks at Hinata, only to see him stricken with horror.

“W-what do you mean, ‘bad experience’?” Hinata asks imploringly. He looks scared, and Tobio finds himself wondering why Hinata looks so guilty.

“It wasn’t really what you’d call a ‘bad experience,” Tobio tries to explain, but then, there’s that ugly feeling again, and Tobio attempts to push it down; all the way down to his feet.

“It’s just--well, it’s kind of like--that--” Tobio stumbles over his words, and he licks his bottom lip and tries to swallow away the sudden dryness in his mouth.

“A long time ago,” Tobio manages to get out. “It happened a long time ago and I just can’t forget it. Stupid, right?”

Tobio has no choice to wait for a response that still has yet to come after thirty seconds. It’s silent for a moment. _But it’s the bad kind of silent_ , Tobio thinks. It’s the type of silence where you want to say something, anything, just to start the conversation again. He feels like he ended the banter badly, and looking at Hinata’s face now, he knows that he has fucked up.

“You…” Hinata starts off with a whisper, and Tobio feels a wave of premonition hit his chest. “You really don’t remember, don’t you?”

Tobio’s eyes narrow, because he just said he had remembered what happened eighteen years ago,  buried in the depths of his mind.

He suddenly regrets that he doesn’t remembered where he has buried it.

Tobio has nothing to say, and he clamps his mouth shut, clenching his teeth together so that he doesn’t say something stupid and fuck up again.

Hinata stands up abruptly and picks up his small backpack heftily.

“I just remembered I had something to do.” He says with a small smile.

_Both of us know that’s a lie_ , Tobio can’t help but think disdainfully as he watches Hinata’s figure disappear beyond the hill.

(It seems like not saying anything might have fucked it up even more.)

****  


_viii. i can’t find your silver lining_

****  


When Hinata doesn’t come back to the garden for a couple days, Tobio finally admits to himself that, yes, he might have fucked it up.

He makes this weird habit of looking behind him, trying to catch sight of orange hair, but Hinata never comes.

Tobio’s tending to a bed of daisies when he realizes that it’s a lot more quiet than usual around here. Sure, he’s used to being in the garden alone, but it’s better when someone’s with you, starting a conversation instead of making one up with yourself.

But the thing is, Tobio doesn’t exactly know what he did wrong. Sure, he said that he didn’t like sunflowers. Problem was, what was the harm in that?

He lets out something between a sigh and a groan, looking up at the sun and squinting.

Tobio doesn’t understand the hurt look that had been on Hinata’s face. Did he say something out of place? He gulps down his sudden guilt and keeps sifting through the soil, trying to blink away Hinata’s face to the flowers, the flowers that feel like--

Tobio feels something papery, and with brimming suspicion, he fingers into the soil to find that it’s a package of seeds. And not just any seeds.

Sunflower seeds.

Tobio manages to hold in the urge to not throw the seeds across the grass and never see them again. His hands shake a little as he grips the package of seeds tight, almost afraid to let them go.

****  
  


_ix. your hands were very warm_

****  
  


After more than a “couple” of days, Tobio is honestly ready to just throw his hands in the air and scream. He hates it. He hates how affected he could be by some shortie who shouldn’t have any sort of impact in his life. Not even a little. Nope. No influence.

Tobio thinks he’s been going crazy. Every single hour, every single day, he looks behind bushes, through the tall flower beds, behind rocks, to try and spot a head of orange. He tells himself to just give up, because Hinata’s not coming back for a reason, but he keeps doing it and he can’t stop.

Tobio grips the handle of the shovel tightly and forces himself to work, work, and work because it’s always fixed problems like these before, and it always made it go away, temporarily at the least.

After a couple hours, he hears a noise behind him and almost sighs in disappointment when it is only a rabbit. Then, he grits his teeth in frustration. Damn. _Damn._

Tobio remembers the fleeting figure of that boy, how Tobio had waved goodbye, not realizing that it would be his last.

Everytime he thinks about Hinata, he has that _goodbye_ at the back of his head, and Tobio thinks that he has gotten too attached. To who? To some little brat who can change his face from an angry hamster to a four year old who had just received a candy bar.

_Hinata can’t leave_ , Tobio thinks, _He can’t, if he leaves then--_

Tobio shakes his head. He vaguely remembers, shakes all the bad thoughts away, _all of the bad thoughts_ , and out of desperation, just this once, Tobio pleads for it to work.

It doesn’t.

****  


_x. look at me_

****  


“Hey!”

Tobio’s head whips around to see Hinata, smiling and waving. Hinata runs over, surprisingly fast for someone so small, and Tobio feels this unexpected rush of relief crashing over him.

Then, Hinata stops abruptly and looks at him strangely. “Huh,” Hinata starts off. “Well, that’s not something you see everyday.”

Tobio can feel his eyebrows knit together in confusion, Tobio can’t help but narrow his eyes--

“Aw, it’s gone now!” Hinata complains, and he takes his pointer finger to poke at the space between Tobio’s eyebrows.

“What’s gone?” Tobio deadpans, with slitted eyes.

“Smiled.” Hinata says plainly. “You smiled.”

“No, I didn’t.” Tobio snaps.

“Yes, you did~”

“I didn’t.”

“Well, anyway,” Hinata continues. “Sorry that I didn’t come over for a couple days. I had a check up.”

“What kind of check up?” Tobio questions, afraid to know the answer.

Hinata shrugs. “A hospital check up. But it was a--”

“A hospital check up?” Tobio says blandly. “A hospital check up?” _No, Hinata wasn’t mad at me, but Hinata went to the hospital and that’s much much worse, Hinata went to the hospital, why did Hinata need to go to the hospital--_  
  


“Oh jeez, don’t make that face, Kageyama, it’s nothing?”

“Nothing?” Tobio splutters. “Going to the hospital is _nothing_? Why did you need to go to the hospital? Are you sick?”

Hinata went to the hospital? Tobio feels ashamed for not noticing that Hinata hadn’t been feeling well the last time they had seen each other. Now that he thought about it, Hinata had dropped many hints and Tobio just had not realized. Running to the garden everyday, what other than exercise? The flowers...at a hospital, people get many flowers don’t they?

Tobio racked his head for more signs. The cake. It was too sweet. But why would Hinata eat cake that was way too sweet? (Tobio shudders. The ‘Diabetes’ cake...) Letting out a harsh sigh, Tobio runs his hands through his hair, already tired.

His jaw nearly drops when Hinata nods nonchalantly. “Kind of, yeah.”

“Why--” Tobio chokes a little. Besides from being more than a little panicked, Tobio is also confused. If he was only a little sick, then why did Hinata have to go to the hospital? “Why did you need to go to the hospital?” He asks again.

Hinata waits a little. Tobio doesn’t know why Hinata waits. Hinata never waits. He was always the type of person to ramble instead of listen.

“I have a sickness.” Hinata begins slowly. “It’s a sickness that--”

“What?” Tobio says incredulously, but then realizes that he has interrupted Hinata, and embarrassed, he weakly motions for him to go on.

Hinata lets out a nervous laugh, and plops himself on a hearty pile of soil. Then he pats his hand on the spot next to him and smiles weakly. When Tobio raises his eyebrows, Hinata just nods his head.

“It’s kind of a long story.” Hinata tries, and reluctantly, Tobio slowly sets himself down next to Hinata.

“I have anemia.” Hinata announces. “It’s a sickness where my blood cells are lopsided and since my cells are half the size of a normal cell, my body can’t receive enough oxygen. Sucks, huh?”

Tobio only stares, because Hinata’s words only going through his head and out of his ear. “What?!” Are the only words Tobio has the heart to say. He doesn’t know any other way to respond.

Hinata doesn’t look sad, just a little frustrated. “Yeah, ‘s the reason why I’m so short, y'know? My mom always says that eating more will make me taller, but I’m really picky. I hate it, having anemia, because I get tired so quickly.”

“Can--” Tobio splutters, completely taken by surprise. “Can it be cured?”

Tobio curses in his mind when it sounds completely jumbled, like ‘canitbecured’ instead of sounding like a real question, but his eyes widen even more when Hinata shakes his head.

“It can’t.” Hinata says a little sad. “It’s a genetic disease. My mom had it a little and--” Hinata takes a deep breath before attempting to respond again. “Pretty much it.”

Then Hinata jerks a little, and opens his mouth to say another thing, but then he shuts it, and doesn’t dare say another word.

“If you get so tired,” Tobio asks, cautiously, knowing that this is a sensitive topic for Hinata, “Then why did you come here everyday to run?”

Tobio expects Hinata to explain, thinking that the exercise was probably needed to make a sick person stronger, but Hinata just splutters, and his ears turn red.

“Well, I was just running past here one day, and--” Tobio can see Hinata visibly swallow, and he swallows himself in nerves. “I was looking for some sunflowers, and I couldn’t find any so--” Hinata coughs, looking down. “I was trying to find some in your garden, but there wasn’t any so I just, uh, needed sunflowers.”

Tobio notices that Hinata says this last part a little too awkwardly, and scratches at his neck.

“Well, are you okay then?” Tobio asks.

Hinata looks shocked for a moment, then he nods vigorously.

“Yeah, I am.” Hinata says with more enthusiasm.

Tobio finds himself nodding as well. “Good.”

Suddenly, Hinata jumps back and points at him, screeching.

Tobio, a bit alarmed, looks around wildly, then back at Hinata. “What?”

“You smiled.” Hinata says a little breathless. “You smiled again.”

Tobio frowns at this and his eyes narrow. “Huh?”

“WAIT!” Hinata flings his heads in the air, shaking his head, and Tobio wonders if he got dizzy. “I’m not saying that you don’t smile, it’s kinda just that you have a nice smile.”

Oh. Tobio sighs and realizes that he was holding his breath. He scolds himself, _holding your breath, what--_

Then there’s orange. It flashes at Tobio at his eyelids, blinding him until he can’t see anything other than orange. Tobio yelps and stumbles back as he hears a shriek from the other side of him.

“Kageyama, are you--”

Every sound or noise drowns, sounding like he is listening directly from underwater. Tobio can’t breath, and he panics, flailing for what seems like hours. The orange doesn’t fade. If anything, it only gets brighter.

Then, abruptly, the orange stops, and for a moment, Tobio can see Hinata, leaning over him, face masked with worry and Tobio wants to tell him that _it’s okay, I’m fi_ ne, when another memory hits him. This time, there’s flower crowns, petals falling down on his hair, warm brown eyes, and orange hair.

Tobio chokes in fright as he calls out, but he doesn’t know what he’s calling out for because he can see the figure fading away, and the next thing he knows, Tobio is reaching, begging for the figure to come back.

Tobio feels something wet on his cheek and realizes that they’re tears.

He sees a patch of sunflowers next to a tiny figure with orange hair.

That’s the last thing he sees; everything goes black, taking the orange and the sunflowers with it.

_xi. you’re like the sun and i can’t stop_

****  


Tobio wakes up with a cold sweat, drops steadily dripping down his forehead like rain water. He takes a deep breath. Then another. He tries opening his mouth, but it’s parched. Tobio tries taking a breath, but it comes out in a raspy inhale and he winces.

“Oh! You’re okay!”

The familiar voice makes him see orange and he gets dizzy. His head throbs and he hisses in pain.

“Whoa, take it easy there, Kageyama!” Soft, warm hands hold him up, but Tobio still feels nauseous.

“You…” Tobio tries to say, but it comes out harsh and dry. “What happened?”

He can see some movement from his groggy vision. “Uh, I don’t know, you just passed out, kinda?”

Passed out? Tobio flinches abruptly and sits up. He remembers now, he remembers everything. The flower crowns, the sunflowers, hide and seek....

The orange.

He realizes that Hinata is still holding him up and in a panic, he slaps Hinata’s hand away. Hinata lets out a noise of protest, but Tobio shuts him up with a glare.

“You--” Tobio manages to seeth. “You’re that boy, aren’t you? The one that played that game with me--” Tobio can’t bring himself to say ‘hide and seek,’ and he flushes in shame. “You’re the one that…”

_Disappeared._

“You…remember?” Hinata mumbles quietly, his small hands gripping his t-shirt like a life line.

“Of course I remember you!” Tobio can’t help but cry out, and Hinata freezes. “You left without saying anything, and I just…” Tobio’s eyes narrow in frustration. “... Thought you were going to come back.”

Hinata says nothing and Tobio tries to stifle a scowl. There’s no noise except the chinking of Tobio picking his nails anxiously.

“I…” Hinata says finally. “If I tell you the truth...will you forgive me?”

Tobio wants to scream that he was never mad at Hinata, how could he be, but instead, he just nods stiffly and looks down a little.

“I was always spending time with you…” Hinata starts off slowly, as if Tobio’s reactions are a live ticking bomb that could go off at any minute. “I was always tired when I got home. My mom always got worried that I might collapse one day, because I was always so worn out when I-- Wait, no, it’s not your fault!”

Tobio jolts, not realizing that he was making a face. Coughing a little, he grits his teeth. “Continue.”

“Well, the last day you saw me…” Hinata stops, as if thinking about his choice of words. “I guess it was too cold that day and I had used up too much of my energy, because I got sick, and when my mom took me to the hospital, the doctor said we had to move to some place warmer. Because if it’s cold…” Hinata drifts off, and Tobio finds himself not wanting to finish that thought either.

“I did want to say goodbye, but, if I had stayed any longer, I might have gotten worse.” Hinata finishes with a swallow. “Kageyama…” Hinata looks like he wants to cry, with his face slightly contorted and he bites his lip.

“I’m sorry. Are you still mad?”

Tobio couldn’t believe it. All this time, _Hinata_ had been the one looking for him all this time. _Hinata_ was the one that had to deal with the guilt when he left, all because of the weather. His mouth hangs open, slightly horrified but mostly relieved.

Hinata’s head hangs down and Tobio doesn’t know what to do. He thinks that he should pat Hinata’s head or something, but then he scolds himself because _Hinata’s not a dog!_

“I’m…” Tobio stammers a little. “I wasn’t really mad at you.”

Hinata’s head raises a little, but drops back down. “No, you’re just saying that because you feel sorry for me.”

“No!” Tobio snaps. “Of course not!”

“Then, what is it?”

“Because I can’t, you dumbass!” Tobio lashes out. “This is new to me! I’m still trying to process this information...”

Hinata’s eyes fill with rage. “You asshole! You think this is easy, huh? You think that--”

“I missed you!” Tobio shouts, and Tobio feels like everything has overflowed. Before, he was used to being alone, but then he felt that it was nice not being lonely. It was nice, and he had forgotten how that felt because before he knew it, that warmth had disappeared and he had nothing to guide him anymore. “I was tired of waiting, and I told you that I already gave up, but I didn’t, okay? Because I like you too much, you dumbass!”

Tobio’s panting and flushing all the way to his ears. His face feels hot; too hot, and Tobio wants the soil to open up and just swallow him up in a hole.

“It’s not really the seven-year-old you either.” Tobio can hear himself mumble. “Don’t think I liked the you from before, because I like the Hinata _now_.”

That sentence comes out weird and Tobio knows it. He can only grimace as there’s an awkward silence between the two of them, and Tobio panics because _what’s Hinata going to say?_

Then there’s a snort of laughter and one giggle follows another until it turns into laughing.

“Kageyama,” Hinata says between laughs. “You sounded really weird just now!”

Tobio gapes for a second, before he grabs Hinata by the head and scowls. “What?!”

“You did!”  Hinata still grins. “Your voice sounded really weird and stuff. Like straight from a romance novel or something like that!”

Tobio’s hands move from Hinata’s head to his shoulder, shaking him violently. “YOU DUMBASS, I’M TRYING TO BE SERIOUS HERE!”

Hinata only shrieks and laughs, while Tobio keeps shaking him.

Then, Tobio feels arms wrap around his torso and he feels something nuzzle into his chest. Tobio looks down, but then immediately brings his head back up, because Hinata was just--hugging--and warmth--and--

_K.O. Critical hit. No survivors._

“Don’t worry, Kageyama!” Hinata looks up with a smile, and the hands around his waist tighten. “This time, I’m not planning on leaving!”

Tobio lets out a small sigh of relief and allows himself to bury his nose onto the top of Hinata’s head. He takes the time to run his fingers into Hinata’s soft, orange hair and breathes into it a little. Then, he realizes that he’s sniffing Hinata, and heat rushes to his cheeks so fast, he must look like a strawberry.

Still a little embarrassed, Tobio smiles a real full-fledged smile for the first time in a long while. It’s refreshing, this new feeling, hitting him like a wave of some sort. Hinata was right, it’s okay now, everything’s okay. He would go and find those sunflower seeds again, and plant them, together with Hinata. They didn’t need flower crowns anymore. They had each other, didn’t they?

Tobio returns the hug a little hesitantly, and Hinata happily leans into it. Tobio feels like he doesn’t have to worry about anything else in the world anymore. Tobio doesn’t need to push Hinata away anymore.

No more, nothing to hold us back.

Because I think you’re here to stay.

****  
  


_fin._

  
_last. i’ll be your star that shines brighter than anyone else_

**Author's Note:**

> lol they cuddle after for HOURS
> 
> special thanks as always to my beta, Czwizard!  
> this was for the kagehina exchange! I hope number 68 likes this!


End file.
